


Run Little Bot

by KarkatSizemore



Series: Feathers and Metal Don't Mix [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Attempted Murder, Crude repair jobs, Davesprite is though, Hal is actually not an asshole, M/M, non-sburb AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-07
Updated: 2015-03-08
Packaged: 2018-03-16 19:12:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3499727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KarkatSizemore/pseuds/KarkatSizemore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hal is an android built by Bro, he has been active for two years now and most of the media has had their fill of him. He doesn't make as many public appearances as he used to, but that's okay. He loves being home with his creator and wants nothing more then to be human.<br/>Other people have plans for him though, and it's a race against a mysterious man who seems to know everything about him. He needs to find somewhere safe to go, but when he's wounded and scared from an attempted execution, who can he trust?<br/>Hal finds out that not all humans are assholes and not all angels have wings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Run Little Bot

**Author's Note:**

> Reference for Hal's outward appearance by me.  
> http://i305.photobucket.com/albums/nn224/Crazykittion/HalBot_zpssgxkwwdj.png

You were sitting in your home, quiet and alone, your creator away. Off of business, you had been told, and didn't question him. After all, he was like your father, and treated you like his son. You sat in his (and your) kitchen, bum firmly planted in a wooden kitchen chair. The cool, smooth surface is easy to relax into, and your bright red eyes settle on the maize-colored tile and black granite counter top, cleaned and spotless, just how you like it. Your creator insists that you don't have to make it so pristine, but you like to, you like to help him. Your master is a quiet man, much like yourself. You wondered if he spoke to others, but you know you wouldn't be able to hear it either way. Your ability to hear never truly functioned right, but you are told (He signs or writes to you) that signing is normal, deaf and mute people use it and that makes you feel more human, and like a human, you can get angry. He tells you to control your temper, due to your once literally flipping the kitchen table over, and you try, going to school and learning among the humans. The only difference are the red lines on your face, glowing faintly and brightly once angered. You are bullied a lot, though you know it is prohibited, you understand that it is a part of the hierarchy. You are new, you are not human. They pick on you because of insecurities, but that doesn't make it hurt less when they throw you into lockers, shove you down in the hallways, sneer and glare and look like you're a monster. 

You suppose you are, in their naíve eyes.

One day, you remember running home, tears streaking down your face after a particularly hard beating (You're forbade from using your superior strength to hurt humans, and you were more scared of hurting them then of them hurting you) and you had run into the city where you're not aloud to go, hiding in an alley and sobbing quietly. You had seen your reflection in a puddle, the marks on your face dull with sadness and you had grabbed two fistfuls of mud and smeared it over your face, covering them up as tears kept spilling until you had nothing left (literally, your tanks only hold so much) but the ache in your chest never went away. You stayed there, refusing to go home even as your power hit half empty, sitting there curled in tight around yourself. You watched the ground, glad you could will your sense of smell away, it looked disgusting there. You watched people walk by, chatting and looking at their phones. Late into the night your creator had found you using your microchip and kneeled down in front of you, gently holding you in his arms and wiping away the mud. You knew he was talking, you could feel the vibrations in his throat on your head, but you did not know what he had said that day. Once you returned home he stayed with you, telling (signing to) you about how wonderful you were, and how to ignore the children because they're just hurt and taking it out on you, they probably feel inferior to you. Which they are, but you try not to treat them as lesser, for one of their own created you and gave you life.

Though in the present once more, your eyes are closed, body in the perpetual state of teenager-dom, legs crossed, foot tapping to the feeling of your gears grinding, the coolant and oil rushing through all the tiny pipes that mimic veins inside. You miss your creator, you always do. You don't like when he is away, or even out of sight most times. You know these actions could be called 'clingy' or 'needy', but you feel empty without him, alone. You mind falters and your foot does too, then rests on the tile when your train of thought goes to just that. You would be alone without him. You have no friends, the media only wish to expose you, and your lack of humanity and overall social skills prevent the people who don't hate you to feel inclined to perhaps initiate something. Your lips part and you sigh, synthetic lungs pulling and pushing out air, a relief and relaxation spreading through you with the motion. It is a calm night, clear, the moon is in its new quarter, and the trees are dark and the stars and planets twinkle in small, fleeting "hello's" to all who watch. The gentle breeze sweeping though the leaves and grass stir up the small bugs and the bats who eat them, darting black shapes across the sky. It is peaceful, calm, gentle... 

Your hand reaches back and feels around the cord in your neck charging your body, fingers clasping around it as you gently remove it. The resulting tingle throughout your body as you switch to internal power is odd and pleasant, and you stand to perhaps read a book. You like reading, it is a good pass time and you can imagine being a human with human problems, perhaps even a Prince in another dimension, meant to save the world and all his friends. Another sigh, a happy one, as your mind wonders, and you take a step to visit the bookshelf, hesitating and stopping all of a sudden as you think of something you must do in your bedroom, on the other side of the home. As you hesitate though, a shatter rings through the home and glass comes at your body. You shield your eyes and take a step back, fumbling before slipping on a fallen shard of the broken window, hitting the ground with a heavy thud and scrambling back as a man from the outside, dressed in all black, smashes the butt of his gun against what was left of the black-tinted glass. He steps inside and the gun raises to his shoulder, prepared for the recoil. You're frozen in shock, eyes wide and mouth hanging open, wanting to plead, beg, /something/ before his finger rests on the trigger and pulls.


	2. Not Too Bad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hal runs and ends up shutting down, Bro, his creator, is nowhere to be seen. Hal throws himself at a stranger on the street hoping they will help him and wakes up in a strange place hooked up to a car battery.  
> What could go wrong?

There is an inaudible bang and your body recoils at the force of the impact as the bullet tears through the sensory nerves within the tissue of your synthskin, and it jars you into action. Your brain kicks into high-gear as you get up and run down the hallway, black, ink-like oil starting to run down your arm and you try to still it as much as possible. What was happening? What was he doing in your home? You round the corner of the hallway and are met by a man mere feet from your body, gun in hand and clad in all black like the first. This time though, you notice that he has green mark on his chest and you turn without another thought. Something, a bullet you're sure, hits your calf and grazes off to the left, splitting the skin and making a metallic 'clink' when it hit the metal beneath, sliding off and burying itself into the floor. You bolt into the bedroom and don't think twice before slamming your shoulder into the glass door that led to the pool out back. Another shot, right behind you, ripping through your thigh and tearing out the front, hitting a tree not too far away. You jump the fence, nearly catching your foot of the now wounded leg and run to the forest behind your home, tears falling down your face and dripping onto the grass alongside the oil from your arm, the stream from your leg following suite. It hurts, god it hurts, but you run, you run and run and when you're sure they're too far behind you, you backtrack and climb up into a tree, hopping from one branch to the other, pained sounds getting caught in your throat with each kick, each push and grab of a branch. Eventually, you're near the town, in the park, actually, and drop from the tree you were in, hobbling to an alleyway. You grin to yourself and sit on the corner, eyes burning and chest aching with hate and rage. You call your creator to tell him what happened, but it goes straight to voice mail. Odd. He never turns his phone off when he's gone... You fear the worst.

You sit there though, eyes drifting open and closed. You can't go anywhere, you're so tired. Your systems are shutting down, preparing for maintenance. You fight it, fight the programming, fight what it /suppose/ to happen when you're hurt. You have to find someone to fix you, or find something to fix yourself with. Struggling to stand, you brace yourself against the cracked brown and red brick wall and start down the street. Your grey arm sleeve is stained black, the edge of your red t-shirt sharing the same fate. You're in too much shock and pain to really care though. You walk slowly, unsure if the lack of people on the street is normal or not this time of night. You wish it wasn't, you want someone to find you, to help you fix this awful feeling. You've never been this hurt before, it is a horrible feeling and you want it to stop, but you have to keep moving. You walk, one step hurting more then the last as more and more vital fluids leak from your body. Your vision is glitching, going to white every few steps. It's jarring, painful, horrible. Then you see him. Well. You /think/ its a him, your vision has gone from bad to worse. You think he's coming towards you, but whatever direction, it's leisurely, so you speed up, ignoring the pain in your leg and arm and going towards him, a garbled "help" escaping your lips. You're too mixed up with pain to think clearly, once you're close you grab his shoulder and he grabs you in return, you can't see his face but you see his mouth part in a sound you can only assume is a gasp, etched into your mind before your body shuts down.

The red bar appears across your black vision, 'Sleep Mode, Maintenance In Progress' you can think, but your body is numb, all you see is that stupid bright red bar with lettering. You hope this isn't how things are going to end, you body slowly running out of power until nothing is left. It has happened before, you had wondered too far with too low of battery and shut down in the woods. You were not aware of anything, you don't remember your master taking you home and plugging you in. But when you had woken, you cried and clung to him for an hour, shaking with fear. You had died, in the human sense. Your life force was gone and your body was a husk of wires and metal. It had scared you, terrified you into never letting your power get to 1/4 full. You're paranoid now, or were, and you hope that you wake up soon, before your body shuts down completely. Your master is gone, to where, you don't know, and you wish and hope and pray that the man you had fallen on helps you and doesn't toss you away or give you to those men. You count the seconds, minutes, hours and your very being is shaking and crying, though you can't feel your body, the dread in your chest is there, and you don't /want/ to die.

'Maintenance Complete, Power Restoring To: H.A.L.'

Your eyes open slowly and sensation comes slowly back to you, fingertips, toes, ankles, wrists. You flex each joint as they come online and once you can, your smile is wide and you stare at the light above you, pupils dilate to tiny slits like a cat. You're awake...the power from something is flowing into you. The pain is gone, and your sensors say that your oil is restored. You run full systems check and find that your arm has been crudely fixed, same with your thigh. Feeling returns and you feel the coldness of the table you're on top of on your bare skin. Wait. Since when were you naked? You deduce that you can sit up and do, very slowly, eyes widening when you see your chest open and two metal pincers attached to your main power core. You follow the wires and see they're attached to a car battery, and can't help the dry laugh at the crudeness of the rig. But you appreciate it none the less. You look around and see it appears like any other car garage, but lacking the car. There are basic tool sets on the shelves and a bike sat in the corner, spray painted hunter orange. You look down at your metal body, uncovered by synthskin. Your creator had decided that it would be difficult to remove it all if you required anything major, and left your torso uncovered. It could all be removed, of course, but the hassle was too much for the entirety of your body. Hence why you could never be shirtless (in public at least), but that never really bothered you. It was a reality of your life, and you delt with it. But this is different, you're in a strange place with no one around, hooked up to a battery you can tell is halfway drained. You require a lot of energy to even be awake. You examine your leg and see the wires have been soldered and the small, vein-like pipes welded back. You also notice that the secondary plate over your thigh was screwed on wrong. You grab a drill and take the small screws back out and place them between your lips, lining it up properly, and putting them back in. You touch your shoulder and feel where your metal was peeled back and melted into a messy, but solid part again. You've never had patchwork done to you before, your creator always made you repairs seamless. It's odd, but you're happy they at least knew something about what they were doing.

Footsteps echo in the room next to the one you're in, you can sense them with some unnamed device your master had made you, to help detect where he is, where people and birds and lizards and trees are. Your eyes watch the door curiously, excitement buzzing at your wires as a tall skinny man, around the age of your creator, maybe younger, steps in, seemingly startled by you. His hair is a light orange and hangs flat around his face. He wears a plain white shirt and black jeans, and a pair of sunglasses cover his face. You can see small hints of freckles creeping out from under the rim of them, and can in fact see his eyes from behind the tinted glass, but he looks normal, nothing special. His mouth moves and his body language just screams worry, he motions to the door he entered and starts rubbing his temples, and you suppose he's muttering to himself. You can't help but chuckle and thank him, he waves a hand at you. You roll your eyes and point out that you can't hear a word he says, but he looks up and you read his mouth, 'What?'

You repeat yourself, and inform him that you can read his lips, but the way he moves his mouth makes it difficult, its a bit off, like he wants it to move as little as possible, and it distorts your results. You tell him he's hard to read, and if he cannot adjust that he will have to write things down. He groans and you smile, waving at you before turning and going back inside, he has a notepad in his hand and a pen in the other when he returns, and shows you the first page, words already written on it.  
'Why are you in the news?'  
You blink and tilt your head, eyebrow raised. You don't have a clue, other then your usual interviews with the news people, but you don't think that's what he's talking about, if the nervous twitch of his fingers and the slight frown to his mouth are anything to go by. You shake your head and ask him why he asks, his mouth tilts down more into an almost frown. He takes the notepad back and writes again, and when he turns it back to you your eyes get wide and your hands dent the metal of the medical bed you sit on.  
'You're to be turned into the police for the murder of your creator.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys like, let me know in the comments if you think I should continue this and any ideas you have for the furtherment of the plot, if you would like a sexy scene between these two nerds, and so on.

**Author's Note:**

> Wooo! Glad to get this out here. Though I had fun writing this, i'm not sure if i'll continue it, I'll have another chapter coming out soon, but other then that I haven't got anything down. If I get enough support I'll work for finishing this.


End file.
